How The Hell Did We Wind Up Like This
by ltjvt1026
Summary: A TIVA songfic. OOC for me I know, but I'm trying to stretch out a little for the New Year. This was supposed to be a oneshot. But now it's a twoshot. See the A/N. So do a guy a favor and R&R. Please?
1. Tony

**Disclaimer: The copyrighted material contained within does not belong to me. No profit is being made. Just me playing in a sandbox of my own making.**

**Spoilers: **Aliyah, Truth or Consequences, Reunion

**Author's Note: **One of my New Year's resolutions was to _try_ to write things out of my comfort zone. So here's my attempt at TIVA. My son was listening to Nickelback. The song "Someday" came on. It just struck me that it was about Tony and Ziva. Then my muse started yapping at me and wouldn't shut up until I wrote this. I'm still trying to find the handle on another story, but that ain't going so well.

**Tel Aviv, Israel, In front of Mossad HQ**

_**How the hell did we wind up like this?**_

_**Why weren't we able, to see the signs that we missed**_

_**And try to turn the tables**_

_**I wish you'd unclench your fists, and unpack your suitcase**_

_**Lately there's been too much of this**_

_**But don't think it's too late**_

"_To save your worthless ass."_

Those words echoed thru Special Agent Anthony DiNozzo's head as he watched his partner, Ziva David walk stiff backed into Mossad headquarters. He'd been called worthless before, but his time it really stung. Ziva had mocked him before, but always with a joking tone. This time there had been real venom behind it.

Tony rubbed the spot on his chest where moments before the barrel of Ziva's Sig had been pressing. DiNozzo had been treated to a look that he was pretty sure was the last thing many a man had seen. For just a split second he'd thought his time was up. Why couldn't Ziva see that Rivkin had been playing her? Not only that but Tony was positive that Daddy David had put Rivkin up to it.

_Well, once I can really sit down with her maybe we can work this out._

Forty eight hours later, those words would ring oh so hollow.

**Tony's bedroom, 0445hrs**

_**How the hell did we wind up like this?**_

_**Why weren't we able, to see the signs that we missed**_

_**And try to turn the tables**_

_**Now the story's played out like this**_

_**Just like a paperback novel**_

_**Let's rewrite an ending that fits**_

_**Instead of a Hollywood horror**_

"_There were no survivors"_

Gibbs would never be accused of sugar coating anything. Those four words delivered in Abby's lab ten days ago spun Tony's world right off its axis. That first night he'd gone home to his apartment, pulled the plug on his land line and turned off his cell. Then he got a bottle of Glenlivet out of his liquor cabinet. It didn't do any good. Halfway thru the bottle, he was still sober. After that he never touched another drop.

For the next nine nights he'd been treated to two alternating dreams.

The first was his fight with Rivkin. That one always went according to script. He shot Rivkin and Ziva came crashing in.

Number two was the confrontation outside Mossad HQ. This one had two endings. Ziva shooting him and Ziva shooting herself. The second ending was _way_ out of character, the first not so much.

This morning's dream however, the reason he was sitting up in bed looking at his clock was different.

In this dream he was sitting in an office overlooking San Francisco in the '40's. Sitting across from him, behind the desk was Bogart as Sam Spade in "The Maltese Falcon". Bogart was looking him dead in the eyes with a hard expression.

"_When a man's partner is killed, he's supposed to do something about it."_

Tony swung his feet to the floor. Time to get his head out of his fourth point of contact. Starting today he would use every means at his command to find Saleem Ulman. Once he found him he would convince Gibbs and Vance to go after the bastard.

Then Tony would _kill_ him. For his partner.

**Men's Room, NCIS HQ**

_**Well I'd hope that since we're here anyway**_

_**That we could end up saying**_

_**Things we've always needed to say**_

_**So we could end up staying**_

_**Now the story's played out like this**_

_**Just like a paperback novel**_

_**Let's rewrite an ending that fits**_

_**Instead of a Hollywood horror**_

"_What matters is you had my back. That you have always had my back."_

As Tony bolted out of the men's room, he was conflicted. He and Ziva had just had a breakthrough. But that breakthrough had also caused a break in the case. He should have stayed. Tony saw in her face she wanted, no expected him to stay. But the case came first. As he neared the bullpen, words he had thought months before came back to him.

"_Well, once I can really sit down with her maybe we can work this out."_

This time it was going to happen, no question.

_**Nothing's wrong just as long as **_

_**You know that someday I will**_

_**Someday, somehow**_

_**I'm gonna make it all right but not right now**_

**A/N: **Someone I have very high regard for pointed out that this is more Tony's song than Tony and Ziva's. I don't know. So, what do you think? Good? Bad? Indifferent? Hit the green button and let the truth come out.


	2. Ziva

**Disclaimer: See the first chapter for all the usual legal mumbo-jumbo.**

**Authors Note:** So, I've been gone for a while. Ten days actually. Went to Florida on vacation with the Boss. No kids. It was great. While I was on the beach on Captiva Island waiting for the green flash (clouds showed up, no green flash) this chapter came to me. This was supposed to be a one-shot. However, both **M E Wofford** & **Betherzz **pointed out that the first song was more about Tony than Tony and Ziva. This caused me to re-think the one-shot thing. So here's the second chapter. Ziva's perspective. There will be no third chapter. My head hurts. The song is "Broken" by Seether with Amy Lee (Don't ask). This writing out your comfort zone stuff is the pits. On a brighter note, I also came up with a new Mike Franks plot line. No beta on this chapter either. Going to try working without a net.

**Spoilers: **Ya think?

**Tel Aviv, Israel In front of Mossad HQ**

'_**Cause I'm broken when I'm open**_

_**And I don't feel like I am strong enough**_

'_**Cause I'm broken when I'm lonesome**_

_**And I don't feel right when you're gone away**_

"_To save your worthless ass"_

Mossad Officer Ziva David was angry. Killing angry. The object of that anger was lying beneath her, her Sig pressed into his chest.

Special Agent Anthony DiNozzo, her partner was two and a half pounds of pressure from death. And he was goading her! Typical Tony. Didn't he realize no one who had ever seen her like this had survived? Of course not.

"KILL HIM", her forebrain was screaming. However, way back in her mind, a tiny voice was whispering "_He was watching your back. He's always watched your back."_

Abruptly she stood, slammed the Sig into its holster and walked stiff backed to the doors of Mossad headquarters.

In the reflection of the glass, she watched Tony struggle to regain his feet. She wanted to run back and help him. To apologize for dropping him onto his bad shoulder. She did neither. She walked away.

**Interrogation room, Saleem's camp, 4 months later**

"_There were no survivors"_

They had come for her, hooded her up and dragged her from her cell. Ziva David figured she was spending her last minutes on this mortal coil. The interrogations and _other activities_ had stopped at least ten days ago. Ziva had been ignored except for food and water delivered occasionally. Ziva had made her peace with God. She was ready to die. She _wanted _to die. Her father had betrayed her. Michael had betrayed her. She had turned her back on the only people who really cared about her. She had forced Gibbs to choose. So he had.

As the hood was ripped from her head and she saw who was wire-tied to the chair opposite her's, she couldn't have been more shocked.

Tony had come for her! In her peripheral vision she saw a familiar form stretched out on the floor. McGee!

_Oh God, we're all going to die here_ was her first thought. But Tony was babbling about a plan. He was wire-tied to a chair and McGee was out cold. Some plan! Wait, where was GIBBS? If Tony was here and McGee was here, GIBBS had to be here.

Ziva suddenly started to think like Mossad again. They were in a room with a large window. The plans of the camp that she had studied those many months ago came back. Ziva knew exactly where Gibbs was. Eight hundred meters away. On the ridgeline. With a sniper rifle.

Several minutes later, when the glass of that window broke and the thud of a high velocity rifle round meeting flesh resounded in the room, Ziva David knew she was going home.

**Men's Room, NCIS HQ**

_**The worst is over now and we can breathe again**_

_**I wanna hold you high, you steal my pain away**_

_**There's so much left to learn, and no one left to fight **_

_**I wanna hold you high and steal your pain**_

"_What matters is you had my back. That you have always had my back."_

As she leaned in to kiss Tony, the images of Michael and Roy flashed thru Ziva David's mind, causing her to alter her aim and kiss him on the cheek.

Ziva had trailed Tony into the men's room after hearing from her two other friends. Abby's rant and McGee's quiet advice had given her the courage to confront Tony. But at the last second she had bailed. People she cared about had a nasty habit of dying. Ziva thought she'd be able to recapture the imitative. Tony though chose that moment to have a breakthrough about the case and went running for the bullpen.

_I'm going to sit him down and we're going to settle this._

Brave words, spoken too soon.

**A/N:** Well, there it is. As I said, no more after this. Let me know how I did by poking the little green button below. Back to more my style of writing soon. Yes, M E, that means a Mike story in the offing.


End file.
